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Re: Three more thoughts on discovering and growing the numbers of diverse books
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From: Diversity in YA <diversityinya_at_gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 10 Feb 2014 13:16:27 -0800
I wanted to respond to Cheryl Klein's post on "Three more thoughts on discovering and growing the numbers of diverse books," especially her last questions:
"What could we do to make this easier for everyone? Do we need a cross-publisher catalogue of titles by diversity groups that would make it easy for interested groups to find the titles that mirror them? Is there an association of church bookstores or a network of literacy-focused organizations whom publisher representatives can contact? What connections and clearinghouses do we need to build to make discoverability easier within mirror communities?"
As Stacy Whitman said, there are many folks out there compiling lists of diverse titles. I think the internet is making inroads in online discoverability -- as long as people look outside the front page of Amazon. Offline discoverability can indeed be a problem, and I'd like to suggest that one thing publishers can do to reach those local communities is to ask their authors for input.
I am an author, and Diversity in YA definitely tackles these issues from the perspectives of authors. We know authors who are writing these books and we are trying to promote the ones that are already out there, especially the ones that don't get the big marketing budgets.
The thing you have to remember is that the author who wrote the book likely
(hopefully!) has some knowledge of their audience and where their readers are. I think it's super, super important to not squander an author's intimate, front-line knowledge of their audience.
For example, and speaking only as myself, I write books about lesbian and bisexual girls. I came out of LGBT media and I am a lesbian myself. I know that there are LGBT community centers all over the US. When I've had extra boxes of my own books, I offer them up to teachers, librarians, AND LGBT community centers. Recently I sent 6 copies of one of my novels to an LGBT center in Vermont, which hosted a reading club for their youth group. The youth group leader wrote me back and told me about his teens' experience of reading my book.
This is direct, grassroots marketing. Publishers do need to think outside the box, and one way to do that is to work with their authors, who might have a foothold in the community they're writing about -- especially if they are authors of color writing about their own communities. This is not always true, but it doesn't hurt to ask. And then if the author does have connections, please work with the author and support them in making use of those connections.
Also I wanted to note that I've really appreciated the discussion on this subject so far, and I really admire the work that folks like Cheryl Klein and Stacy Whitman and Debbie Reese are doing to raise awareness of these issues online, and in the industry, and to advocate for change.
Malinda Lo Co-Founder, Diversity in YA
www.diversityinya.com Diversity in YA - Puttin' a little diversity in ya since 2011.
Date: Mon, 10 Feb 2014 13:16:27 -0800
I wanted to respond to Cheryl Klein's post on "Three more thoughts on discovering and growing the numbers of diverse books," especially her last questions:
"What could we do to make this easier for everyone? Do we need a cross-publisher catalogue of titles by diversity groups that would make it easy for interested groups to find the titles that mirror them? Is there an association of church bookstores or a network of literacy-focused organizations whom publisher representatives can contact? What connections and clearinghouses do we need to build to make discoverability easier within mirror communities?"
As Stacy Whitman said, there are many folks out there compiling lists of diverse titles. I think the internet is making inroads in online discoverability -- as long as people look outside the front page of Amazon. Offline discoverability can indeed be a problem, and I'd like to suggest that one thing publishers can do to reach those local communities is to ask their authors for input.
I am an author, and Diversity in YA definitely tackles these issues from the perspectives of authors. We know authors who are writing these books and we are trying to promote the ones that are already out there, especially the ones that don't get the big marketing budgets.
The thing you have to remember is that the author who wrote the book likely
(hopefully!) has some knowledge of their audience and where their readers are. I think it's super, super important to not squander an author's intimate, front-line knowledge of their audience.
For example, and speaking only as myself, I write books about lesbian and bisexual girls. I came out of LGBT media and I am a lesbian myself. I know that there are LGBT community centers all over the US. When I've had extra boxes of my own books, I offer them up to teachers, librarians, AND LGBT community centers. Recently I sent 6 copies of one of my novels to an LGBT center in Vermont, which hosted a reading club for their youth group. The youth group leader wrote me back and told me about his teens' experience of reading my book.
This is direct, grassroots marketing. Publishers do need to think outside the box, and one way to do that is to work with their authors, who might have a foothold in the community they're writing about -- especially if they are authors of color writing about their own communities. This is not always true, but it doesn't hurt to ask. And then if the author does have connections, please work with the author and support them in making use of those connections.
Also I wanted to note that I've really appreciated the discussion on this subject so far, and I really admire the work that folks like Cheryl Klein and Stacy Whitman and Debbie Reese are doing to raise awareness of these issues online, and in the industry, and to advocate for change.
Malinda Lo Co-Founder, Diversity in YA
www.diversityinya.com Diversity in YA - Puttin' a little diversity in ya since 2011.
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Received on Mon 10 Feb 2014 03:17:00 PM CST
